Nell, of Shorne Mills Part 66

Lady Angleford met him in the hall, and they went at once to the library.

"I can't tell you how glad I am that you have come, Drake--I suppose I may call you Drake?" she said, holding out her hand again to him.

"You shall call me by any name that pleases you," he said, smiling at her, and speaking very gently, for she was still in mourning, and looked very fragile and pet.i.te.

"Thanks. And yet I am not a little nervous. I don't know how you'll quite take the alterations I have made, whether you will think I have been too presumptuous. I shall watch your face with an anxious eye when I take you over the place presently."

"My only feeling is one of intense grat.i.tude," he said; "and I can't express my thanks and surprise that you should have taken so much trouble. I had an idea that the place was all right, that what was good enough for my uncle----"

She winced slightly, but smiled bravely.

"No, Drake; he was an old man, and came here but seldom; you are young, and, I hope, will spend a great deal of time here. After all, it is your real English home."

He nodded, but not very a.s.sentingly.

"I don't know," he said, rather moodily. "I am rather a restless mortal, and find it difficult to settle in any one place."

"Have you been well?" she asked, as she saw his face plainly, for he had turned to the window.

"Oh, yes; quite," he replied.

She looked at him rather doubtfully.

"You are thinner, and----"

"Older," he said, with a smile.

"I was not going to say that; but I was going to say that you looked as if you had not been sparing yourself lately."

He shrugged his shoulders.

"I had rather a rough time of it in Africa--and a touch of fever. It always leaves its mark, you know."

She nodded as if she accepted the explanation; but she was not satisfied. A touch of fever does not leave behind the expression of weariness which brooded in his eyes.

"If you are not too tired, will you come round with me?" she said.

"There's an opportunity now, for all the people are out riding or driving, and we shall be more free than we shall be when they come bustling in."

"Certainly," he said, opening the door for her. "I suppose you have filled the house? Is it a large party?"

"I am afraid it is," she said, apologetically; "but the house is not quite full, for some of the people who are coming to the dance to-morrow will have to stay the night. By the way, I asked you if there was any one to whom you would like me to send a card, but you did not reply."

"Didn't I? I humbly beg your pardon, countess! No, there was no one."

He looked round the hall admiringly.

"You have done wonders!" he said; "and in such a short time! I rode over here from the hotel the other day, and imagined they would take at least a month to finish. And is that the old drawing-room? Can it be possible!

It is charming! Ah, you have left the dining room untouched--that's right."

Lady Angleford laughed.

"There is not an inch of it that has not been touched; but with reverent hands, I hope. It is upstairs that we have done most. The bedrooms, you will admit, wanted thorough renovating."

"Yes, yes," he said, as he walked beside her. "It's all perfect. It must have cost a great deal of money."

She nodded.

"Oh, yes; but it does not matter, you know."

He glanced at her questioningly.

"It really does not," she said. "Have you any idea how rich you are, Drake?"

He shook his head.

"I'm ashamed to say that I don't quite know how I stand. The lawyers jawed about it the other day, and I did fully manage to understand that my uncle had left me everything. Was that fair, countess?" he added gravely.

"Yes," she replied simply. "He wanted to leave me all he could; but I would not let him. You know that I have enough, and much more than enough, of my own. So why should he leave me any more?"

Drake took her hand, and kissed it gratefully.

"You have been very good to me," he said, in a low voice. "Better than I have any right to expect, or deserve."

"No," she said. "And there is no need of grat.i.tude. I wanted to atone----No, that's not the right word. I wanted to make up to you for the trouble I had, all unconsciously, caused between you and him.

And--there was another reason, Drake. Don't get conceited; but I took a fancy to my nephew the first time I saw him." She laughed softly. "And just at present I have no other object in life than the attempt to make him happy."

Drake suppressed a sigh.

Happy? Oh, Nell, Nell! How vain and foolish all this splendor, now he had lost her!

"So you turned my rambling old place into a palace? Well, it was a substantial attempt, and if I am not happy, I shall be the most mulish and ungrateful of men. The place is perfect; it lacks nothing, I should say," he added, as they descended to the hall again.

"Only a mistress," thought Lady Angleford; but she was too wise to say so.

"You haven't told me who is here," he said, as he watched her pour out the tea which had been laid in a windowed recess from which was an exquisite view of the lawns and the park beyond.

"Oh, a host of your friends," she said. "Do you like sugar, Drake? Fancy an aunt having to ask her nephew that! I shall get used to all your fads and fancies presently. There are the Northgates, and the Beeches, and old Lord Balfreed"--she ran through the list, and he listened absently until she came to--"and the Turfleighs."

"The Turfleighs?" he said, with something that was almost a frown; and, seeing it, the countess noticed how stern his face had become.

"Yes. Lady Luce and her father will arrive to-morrow, just in time for the dance. They are staying at a place near here--the Wolfers'. You remember them? They are coming with her, of course."

"Quite a gathering of the clans," he said, as brightly as he could. "It is a long time since Anglemere had such a beau fete. Who is that?" he broke off to inquire. "One of the guests?"

Lady Angleford looked out of the window.

"I am so near-sighted----"

"A tall, thin man, with long hair," he said. "He has just gone round the corner toward the lodge."